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Depends on the build, I would argue Titan armor on a defensive Assault and Ghost on an offensive one.

I dunno a defensive assault just sounds silly to me. I personally prefer ghost armor on assaults seeing as they need to get close to the enemy to smash their face. Ghost armor's natural +20 defense and invis mode are great against enemy overwatch or getting out of sticky situations.

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Originally Posted by Myssa Rei

Just a quick question for fellow players: when do you screen your soldiers for Psi-competency? When I first got the Psi-lab, it was obvious how the higher-rankers went first, but these days I usually screen them when I get them... Which means that the results I get are kind of a mixed bag, especially considering the low Will every squaddie starts out with (around 50 or so). Now given some save-load abuse, I can get squaddies with talents off the bat, but recently I've been getting zilch (been trying to get another Psi-sniper).

The higher the Will the higher the chances of that soldier being a Psionic. I usually only test them for Psionics once they reach the Colonel rank.

I dunno a defensive assault just sounds silly to me. I personally prefer ghost armor on assaults seeing as they need to get close to the enemy to smash their face. Ghost armor's natural +20 defense and invis mode are great against enemy overwatch or getting out of sticky situations.

While I prefer aerial units the Ghost armour is fun when you can use the grappling hook to get out of stick situations.

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You don't lose equipment if your squadmate only gets killed. On the other hand, I heard it's possible to lose equipment if your men gets killed and you lose the mission. Hadn't tested that one though.

Edit: Just did a quick test, and no, it appears that not even a complete squad wipe will make you lose equipment.

End of third month in my Classic Satellite rush. Realised that with NA, Asia and Europe with no satellites yet, and only 4 satellites to send to Europe, the only way to stop countries leaving is to do the Alien Base mission. It is the best time to do it too; next month Asia would be covered leaving only Canada and Mexico. This means no more terror choices.

So yeah, this is my setup:
Start in USA, send three satellites to Africa in 1st month. (Grab engineers when ever you can, and always leave room to add more Workshops every month.)

2 satellites to SA and 1 satellite to either Asian or European nation in the red in 2nd month.
(Get alien containment, start preparing to capture aliens so you can speed through the research credits. The 1st month had almost no research time because I sold most materials so one needs to catch up.)

3rd month, take either all of Europe or Asia with 4 satellites (use Alien base to lower panic).
(Should have most aliens captured alive for research credits. Get steam generators for power. Then try to research Nexus and Elerium plants for the 4th month. Get every ship laser cannons.)

Take the remaining continent in the 4th month and leave Canada/Mexico last. I am tempted to never send satellites there because allegedly full coverage means less missions overall. Is that true or not?

Lost the UK, Mexico and China. The first two I actually lost because I thought I had satellites in reserve and under construction, when in fact I didn't. Thus when their panic level went up, I didn't have satellites available to save them.

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On Sickness: "Like someone filled my journal with junk data and then set it to defragment and gave me the lowest priority possible."

End of third month in my Classic Satellite rush. Realised that with NA, Asia and Europe with no satellites yet, and only 4 satellites to send to Europe, the only way to stop countries leaving is to do the Alien Base mission. It is the best time to do it too; next month Asia would be covered leaving only Canada and Mexico. This means no more terror choices.

So yeah, this is my setup:
Start in USA, send three satellites to Africa in 1st month. (Grab engineers when ever you can, and always leave room to add more Workshops every month.)

2 satellites to SA and 1 satellite to either Asian or European nation in the red in 2nd month.
(Get alien containment, start preparing to capture aliens so you can speed through the research credits. The 1st month had almost no research time because I sold most materials so one needs to catch up.)

3rd month, take either all of Europe or Asia with 4 satellites (use Alien base to lower panic).
(Should have most aliens captured alive for research credits. Get steam generators for power. Then try to research Nexus and Elerium plants for the 4th month. Get every ship laser cannons.)

Take the remaining continent in the 4th month and leave Canada/Mexico last. I am tempted to never send satellites there because allegedly full coverage means less missions overall. Is that true or not?

How in blazes do you get 3 satellites in the first month?

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Lost the UK, Mexico and China. The first two I actually lost because I thought I had satellites in reserve and under construction, when in fact I didn't. Thus when their panic level went up, I didn't have satellites available to save them.

They need to do something to improve what's being worked on and what's in reserve. I had to restart my classic difficulty because it turned out I didn't had 3 sats to send to Africa for the rush and I thought I did....

Japan was in the red but the terror mission was there so after that Asia is now at low panic.

My earlier post describes the process. But essentially in Classic you NEED to start in USA, no tutorial, make sure there is a hole to the right of your first elevator, and don't buy ANYTHING. The goal is to get your 3 satellites started by the 10th by selling everything in the grey market, and still have enough money to build a workshop after getting the engineer reward. Then by the 14th you need to have shot down an UFO (hopefully with intact stuff to sell) so that you can get money together to pay for a Satellite Network.

This would use up all 30 units of electricity the Classic and Impossible base has. So you are not able to build anything else. You also would likely fall behind technologically as you likely would sell the power core and Nav computer, never mind the weapon fragments and alloys.

But if you can get it to work, it is possible to get all of Africa before the month ends and start the 2nd month with more than 500 credits.

Yay, I finally was able to beat Classic after my first fail. Sheesh, in the beginning stages it's just total murder on troops when fighting the aliens with conventional weapons and armor. Once I finally got my hands a squad of soldiers with some Titan and Plasma weapons that's when things finally evened up. After that point it, it's my turn to steamroll roll the aliens.

To clarify why this tactic won't work on other continents: you start with more money in North America enough to buy 3 satellites when you have 9 engineers after the first abduction basically.

It's a gambit, you need a bit of luck with the date of the first missions but it will definitely work although it's not necessary to beat classic ironman with it.

Interesting that the side effect is by week 4 I have 2000 dollars in the bank and nothing to spend it on, because I fell behind on research and materials. To sell everything in the Grey market in the first month does hurt. It convinced me to build one laboratory for the first time.

Oh, I found out that Overseer re-appears if you missed it. But each time it runs away, it affects your monthly game assessment.

But what is the game assessment good for anyway? In the original doing well means a pay raise. But in this new game it does absolutely nothing, I can't get fired for having a low score, and they don't change my pay at all.

Yesterday we let our speculation over XCOM’s inevitable DLC run as rampantly as a panicked Sectoid, but 2K and Firaxis have their own vision for XCOM’s post-release content. Today they announce the impending deployment of Slingshot, a tri-Council-mission campaign set in a besieged China featuring a new playable squad character, enhanced customization options, and a couple research shortcuts.

While in China, the XCOM organization encounters a lone Triad VIP sporting a unique look and voice for escort in the first mission, after which he dons the bulky armor and rock-and-roll cannons of a Heavy and joins your squad with increased stats. GameSpy‘s report carries further details on Slingshot’s aesthetic—for one, China looks appropriately Asian-themed instead of Urban Ruins Template 12-A. The remaining two missions involve a UFO boarding action in the skies above Asia.

Completing all three of Slingshot’s missions unlocks a research shortcut to the almighty Blaster Launcher and Fusion Lance weapons, both normally end-game technologies with significant R&D time for acquisition. Alternative appearances for Titan, Ghost, Archangel, and Psi armors, as well as more hairstyles and helmets round out Slingshot’s increased customization options for your soldiers. At the same time, Slingshot misses its 20 percent opportunity for brand new aliens, equipment, and abilities—content many commanders clamored for since XCOM’s launch but somehow missing from Firaxis’ first DLC offering.

Slingshot lacks a release date yet beyond a cryptic “soon” from Firaxis. In the meantime, the rest of humanity still needs saving. Get to it, commander!

Also, the Elite Soldier Pack is now available as DLC on Steam.

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On Sickness: "Like someone filled my journal with junk data and then set it to defragment and gave me the lowest priority possible."

I am loving the Ghost armour. I would miss the immunity to poison of Titan, but the ability to go invisible for one turn is a godsend if I didn't savescum. And the ability to effectively have 100% crit 4 times a battle is more than enough for any single soldier. It's just too good, Titan can't match it.

My scientists are working as hard as they can. but every time they finish a project I have to wait until they got more alien artefacts before they can continue. So the laboratory really isn't making a difference. Not when there are 4-5 days of nothing happening.

But what is the game assessment good for anyway? In the original doing well means a pay raise. But in this new game it does absolutely nothing, I can't get fired for having a low score, and they don't change my pay at all.

Indeed. Your monthly score really isn't good for anything. As long as you can manage to keep panic down in countries, a lower score doesn't effect you. It's not like in the original Xcom where high performance brought an incremental bonus.

As far as I'm aware, letting a couple of UFO's get away doesn't increase to panic. Things like abduction sites and Terror attacks lead to panic.

Somewhat interesting, but I don't know if I'll buy it. Maybe if it's 5 bucks, but more than that it's not worth it. Especially when it's only 3 additional mission, some cosmetics, and no new abilities to play with.

Well I'm into June for Classic and so far pretty good. Aside from South America all of the other continents have satellites (except 2 in Asia) and interceptors with plasma cannons.

Only country I lost was Argentina but because I know exactly what I want I was able to procure 6 light plasma guns and at the moment researching the heavy/sniper plasma

Didn't even bothered with beam weapons at all. Found it useless.

I couldn't build a nexus due to lack of computers and the last UFO was a supply ship and I had no fighter that could down it. On that matter I read that you should never shoot down a supply ship...is that true?

Long story short, Ghost Armour is far more versatile than Titan Armour. Other than Escort/Bomb Missions where you will encounter a crapload of Thin Men, Titan Armour doesn't really often much benefits.

The innate +20 Def from Ghost Armour already means that when Aliens try to shoot at you, their accuracy is reduced by a flat 20%. So it works out better than the additional +4hp that Titan Armour has.

It's like in MMORPGs, where when tanks focus purely on HP and earn the curses of their healers who sarcastically call them mana-sponges because they ignored the importance of armour ratings and avoidance effects.

Extra HP is good, but when you don't get hit in the first place, the extra HP means nothing.